ASTROLOGY CLASSES  (Details)


* Beginning Astrology: Planets, Signs & Houses

   Three-Day Workshop

   $450.

   June 21-23, 2019

This session is designed both for those new to astrology and also for anyone who would like to deepen their understanding of this rich and lyrical language.

We cover the three sets of astrological symbols which, when integrated, create the field of inner energy that describes and informs your personal journey.

A natal reading before you meet with this group is essential.


* Cosmic Travelers: Transiting Planets at Work

   Two-Day Workshop

   $395.

Each day of each year, planets in the sky are moving at different speeds and creating a virtual kaleidoscope of influences upon your innate inner energy patterning. No wonder we sometimes feel overwhelmed by all that a single day offers up.

This workshop will help students of astrology to deepen their understanding of the overlapping energy cycles created by transiting planets.

You will have a copy of your natal chart with the transiting planets inserted so you can get a clear sense of how the cosmic weather is affecting your life.

This is a great workshop for anyone who has taken the beginning class and wants to more deeply explore cosmic energy movement. It is also a great refresher and touchstone for long-time students of astrology.


* Imagining the Unimaginable 

   One-Day Workshop

   $75.

We truly are living in a time which seems to resonate with Alice’s Wonderland. The stranger things get, the more important it becomes to see These Interesting Times within the context of Eternal Time. We are told that we’re very near the end of a 26,000 year epoch. The movement of the planets--our inner energetic archetypes--is teaching us how to align ourselves with the new waves of consciousness moving around and within us.

The planetary cycles discussed in this workshop will be revolutionary Uranus in fiery Aries, Saturn’s ride through alchemical Scorpio, Neptune healing through its native sign, Pisces, and psychically transformative Pluto working through earthy Capricorn. We’ll discover the wise and powerful teachers hidden within each of these often maligned archetypes.

I will provide natal charts for everyone in the group so that you can see which areas of your life are being most powerfully affected and which of your inner archetypes are being called upon to rise bravely and clearly and creatively to this amazing time.

You will want to have had your natal chart read before you meet with this group.


* Healing Heart: Neptune & Chiron in Pisces

   One-Day Workshop

   $75.

We are in the process of healing wounds to our own hearts which are ancient and, at some levels, collective.

This session is different from the one mentioned above in that here we will focus on transiting Neptune and Chiron. These two planets are teaching us how to heal ancient and deep wounds to our hearts so that we can remember our place in the universal light body.

This workshop will help you focus on the areas of your life where you have carried heartache from one lifetime to another. You will be able to see both the wounds and the grace notes of potential healing.

You will want to have had your natal chart read before you meet with this group.


* Your Sun’s Journey

   One-Day Workshop

   $75.

Would it be easier to work with the larger issues in your life if you knew when they were going to come into the Light of your consciousness most intensely? 

What if you knew that each year in March, the Sun moving through the sky was going to trigger an old wound in you? Or what if the Sun was going to shed light on one of your greatest desires each year in May?

During this workshop, we’ll track the annual journey of the transiting Sun to learn how it affects the different planets and houses in your own personal zodiac. 

Because each of us has a different Rising Sign, we encounter the Sun in the houses of our chart at different times of the year than anyone else. It is this Sun journey which determines the timing of your annual ups and downs. It is a great help to know which of your planets the Sun is going to illuminate each year, always in the same month, so you will be aware, when those issues arise year after year, of the kind of cosmic lesson you are rising into again and again.

I’ll provide your natal chart with the addition of the annual dates of the Sun’s entry into each house so you can track its journey through your archetypical houses and notice how the seasons of the Sun define your year.

You will want to have had your natal chart read before you meet with this group.


* I Ching: Working with the Sage

   Half-Day Workshop

   $55.

I will introduce the I Ching--it’s history, it’s relevance to our lives today, it’s many translations, and a discussion of which translations serve each individual best.

Before each participant takes a turn throwing the coins, we’ll discuss the process of approaching The Sage . . . how does our intent and our longing shape our question?

This will be a review of how this remarkable oracle has evolved as well as a chance for those new to the Sage to learn how to throw and interpret the coins.

Participants should bring their I Ching journal in order to ask questions about individual hexagrams, especially those hexagrams which seem to surface repeatedly in the progression of your on-going conversation with The Sage.


Contact Deborah O’Connor

CREATIVE CLASSES  (Details)


* Watercolor Painting: A Beginning

   One-Day Workshop

   $95. 

This day will be devoted to discovering how much joy you can find in creating with watercolor paint.

I’ll lead you through simple exercises which will help you to bring some of your inner light out onto the surface of soft white paper.

We’ll experiment with paint at the same time that we will create a series of symbolic cards filled with symbols which represent your inner voice.

This workshop is meant for everyone. No previous experience with “art” necessary. I think that, along with much of our language, we must drop away from the word “art” and begin to think more spaciously. Each of us carries a creative spark the size of a star. It’s all a matter of learning to access it. 

Please join us as we learn to capture a little of the Light with paint and a grand sense of playfulness. You will discover a part of yourself which may have been in hiding all of this lifetime.

All art materials will be supplied and you will return home with your own set of fine watercolor paints.

                                                                

* Mandala Workshop: Coming Full Circle

   Two-Day Workshop

   $195.

The word mandala means ‘circle.’ And the circle is a symbol which has, for all time, represented what is self-contained and whole. So we approach the creation of the mandala through the family of visual symbols which reflect and support our connection to our Divine Self.

We begin the mandala at its center (your metaphorical Center) and then move outward with the symbols and archetypes which feed your embodied journey creating a sense of your Presence. The intent is to create a visual reminder of the healing energies which surround you throughout all of time.

For some people, these symbols take the form of mammals or birds, for others the primary symbols come from the world of plants. Some create an entire mandala using patterns to suggest movement. Some create images which arise in dreams. Most of us combine all these to create images, which taken together, suggests the wholeness we carry within.

There is no right or wrong approach to this creation, no images or materials more worthy or not. The ways to create your mandala are infinite. Some choose to use pencils and paints exclusively, others may feel more comfortable with collage . . . you can bring your own poems and photos and song lyrics to add to your piece.

I provide large pieces of sturdy Arches watercolor paper along with watercolor paints, colored pencils, watercolor pencils, soft pastels, and oil pastels.


* Remembering the Inner Temple

   One-Day Workshop

   $95.

In the center of the castle of Brahman, our own body, there is a small shrine in the form of a lotus flower, and within can be found a small space. We should find who dwells there, and we should want to know her.   Chandogya Upanishad

This is a day devoted to discovering the nature of your inner temple. Will it unfold in layers of color? Will it be a single simple symbol? Will it be a collage of many symbols or animals or words? The possibilities are as varied as each of us are. This Center is a deep and mysterious place and we will lead into the creative process with poetry and meditation as the workshop begins.

You can draw or paint or collage with old photos or magazine images . . . or you can use all these to create your image.

I’ll provide the paper, paints, pencils and pastels and you bring your desire to enter your inner shrine.


* Mapping the Heart: Discovering Inner Symbols

   One-Day Workshop

   $95.

How many times have you heard yourself telling your “Story” and wished that you could break out of the patterns you feel yourself repeating, over and again?

The Cosmos is almost begging us to break out of the shells we’ve inhabited for so much of our lives.

We will spend the morning with guided writing exercises to help you recognize the repeating voices within your personal narrative. Once the old story is written down, you’ll move on to create a new script, one to enable your heart’s desires a clear and sustainable voice.

And, finally, you’ll use pencils, paint and pastels to create a simple visual icon to remind yourself of who you are becoming.

There will be poetry, brief meditations, quiet and private writing time, and we’ll finish with the creation of the visual piece.

You do not have to be a ‘writer’ or an ‘artist’ to join this group. No one but you will hear the words you spill onto the page. And the point will not be to make a work of ‘art’ but to become aware of the deep calling within you which has been quietly waiting for your old identity myth to dissolve so that the crystal clear voice of your divine self might surface and blossom.

I’ll provide journals, pencils, pens and paints.


* A Wing & A Prayer: Creating Your Spirit Bird

   One-Day Workshop

   $95.

Rumi put it so purely: Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding--the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as bird wings.

On this day we will create a bird of your own design. This exquisite creature will rise out of your imagination and help you to remember your wings.


* Paint Your Pet: Honoring Our Soul Guides

   One-Day Workshop

   $95.

How to honor and celebrate the essence of our beloved animal familiars?

We can paint them geranium red with cerulean spots. We can paint them metallic gold with emerald eyes. We can draw them sitting on top of the world or eating out at the local deli. We can create their Light Bodies under our wings or we can simply give them wings . . . or create for them a place in the long line of mythical deities. We can paint only the eye of our companion as it reflects the crescent moon.

We will take a single day to create a portrait of our companions which delights and honors both them and us. You can draw or paint or collage or mess with an enlarged photograph . . . or combine all these mediums.

I’ll provide the paper, paints, pencils and pastels and you bring your sense of humor and your gratitude for this perfect partnership.


Contact Deborah O’Connor